Sunday, March 23, 2008

Women and Caste

All liberation movements and manifestos start with a call for unity. Revolutions always require the “oppressed” and the “oppressors” to happen. Binaries are always so dramatic. But what happens to the multiplicities which can’t be simplified so easily? Where do all these subtle shades emerge within the same color? The emergence of the Dalit women’s voice is significant for mainly two reasons: first, it marks the emergence of a new subject, and second, it shows the inadequacy of the concept of generalization. While the Dalit Panthers Manifesto classifies “women” as Dalits, there are vast differences between Dalit women and their upper caste counterparts. Popular misconceptions and ignorance still color the ideas that propel the feminist movement in India.

The Ancient of Days

With the coming of the Aryans, the Dravidians were displaced. Manu declared the role, status, duties, and powers of the four Castes. The objective was obviously to consolidate the position of the Brahmins and the Kshatriyas, and to ensure the subjugation of the lower castes and the untouchables (who were largely the defeated and enslaved Dravidian people). Thus were devised philosophies and laws which crushed all chances of resistance. Divine sanction behind the Caste system made any revolution impossible. The woman became an important instrument in maintaining it. As Uma Chakravarti says in her essay Conceptualizing Brahmanical Patriarchy in Early India, control over women’s sexuality became crucial in this aspect. Women from upper caste were forbidden to marry or bear the children for the men of lower castes; so as to prevent caste-mobility; on the pretext of maintaining “purity”. Lower caste women were to serve as slaves and Devadasis, and children born to them were to be considered as lowly. Mixing of castes was the worst crime; the matrimonial columns today still bear the testimony of this command. Hereditary occupations thus became obligatory, and thus the Dalits were stuck with illiteracy, poverty and denial of dignity forever.

The Step Sisters: the Caste-Class-Gender Axis in Modern India

The case of the Dalit women is a complex one. Gender equations can’t be simplified solely on the basis of economic factors. For the upper caste women, empowerment ends with the dream of working and earning. However, “going out and earning” has not altered the gender equations within the Dalit community. There, women have no control over their income. Alcoholism and domestic violence very common. But the kind of domestic violence that a Dalit woman faces is very different from that which happens in an upper caste household. The Dalit woman is at the lowest rank in the hierarchy of caste, class and gender: not only does she face caste discrimination, but she also bears the brunt of anger and frustration from men in her community. There are no complaints, because it’s taken for granted that all Dalit women are beaten up and nothing can be done about it.

The workplace is not a promising arena either. Dalit women are always employed in menial jobs. Uneducated and powerless, they are employed for tasks like scavenging, cleaning toilets, carrying bricks, etc. at a lower wage than men. They become easy targets for abduction, rape and molestation by men of both upper and lower castes. Modernization has only opened up new avenues of exploitation for Dalit women. In a study, Joopaka Subhadra observes, the majority of prostitutes and bar dancers in the metropolitan cities come from the Dalit communities. The Devadasi and Yogin customs continue even today in many parts of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Of the few who are emancipated, even fewer are rehabilitated, and the rest become prostitutes.

Damsels in Distress

As per the 1981 census, the male-female ratio was particularly low in states like Rajasthan, Haryana, Punjab, etc with an average of 0.89. The southern states fared better with an average of 0.97. The ratio is lower among the Hindu scheduled castes and Dalits than the Muslims. The phenomenon has been attributed to the practices of female infanticide. Anthropological data confirms that the rites are performed as soon as the child is born, yet records indicate that more female children died (as compared to male children) beyond the age group of female infanticide ;i.e.; between one to 5 years. Moreover, female-male ratio is lower in the 30+ age group. As Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen concludes; this leads to the conclusion that apart from the custom of infanticide, female children die due to neglect and lack of medical attention. Participation of girls in labor-force can be viewed as an additional possible reason. Women also remain deprived of nutrition and related health improvements. This clearly indicates that distribution of resources is in favor of men.

Society and thought

In the field of Education and the Job sector, Dalit presence is almost negligible. Dalit women are even rarer. The few Dalit women who are educated hardly have any influence to facilitate major changes or gender mobilization. The women who belong to affluent Dalit families face a slightly different problem. These families, having improved economically, want social prestige. For that, it is necessary to adopt the upper caste (class) lifestyle. Thus, the fierce patriarchal norms and practices of the upper caste households are fast spreading among the middle class Dalits. This trend is especially dominant in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. Thus, like “respectable” upper caste people, Dalit women are now expected to manage the household and remain indoors.

Dalit women enjoy little social prestige and political representation. Hierarchies operate even within Dalit communities, so often, reservation and other facilities are monopolized by the dominant caste. According to many educated Dalit leaders, women should be allowed 50% reservation instead of 33% in the Parliament, and within that, all communities should enjoy proportional representation. Yet, the danger of silence remains: Prof. Yesudasan points out that even with reservation, the voice of the upper caste women are more likely to overshadow that of the Dalits.

The voice of the Dalit woman is a faint cry. Unlike Brahmanical feminism, Dalit feminism is a more complex entity, and cannot be solved by aping the strategies of Women’s liberalization movements of the West. The problems faced by Dalit women are more difficult to address, because they form a minority within a minority; and are stratified within themselves. Given its recent emergence, the Dalit feminist movement has a long way to go. Attempts are made to raise awareness and spread literacy, and several political organizations are being formed to forward their cause and urge for their development. Individuals have emerged, but for the entire community it’s still a distant target to achieve.

The university space is more liberal than the rest of the country in terms of caste?

Archive

Responses

Dear friends,Me and some of my friends would like to know a certain thing : who was the high caste bengali student who didnt want a Dalit for a room mate.As far as we think, when someone chooses their room mate, what they see is if they can get along well with each other. Did anyone ask someone his/her caste while doing so?A reply will be appreciated.Thank you, Shukti

From the Editor:As far as we think, when someone chooses their room mate, what they see is if they can get along well with each other. Did anyone ask someone his/her caste while doing so?A reply: As far as the editors are concerned, we sincerely do not know of any such case where a bengali upper caste student refusing to share rooms with a Bengali Dalit student 'citing' (if one would really cite it) the particularity of caste differences. but that is definitely not a claim made in the survey report. let us take a look at was being claimed in the report:We share rooms with people whom we are comfortable with. That is definitely true. *But a survey of shared rooms in the 3 hostels indicates that in over 70% of the shared rooms, the roommates are of the same caste.* Though choice of roommate may be made on the basis of linguistic or religious or course wise uniformity, it remains a question whether a Bengali Higher caste student (to take one example) would share a room with another Bengali Dalit student. Cultural differences are significant in such choices but these differences might just preclude caste differences too.the example is clearly a hypothetical situation drawn up to explicate the point that among people who are obviously sharing rooms with people from the same linguistic community, there is a peculiarity of caste uniformity observed. again as we choose roommates with whom we are comfortable with or as shukti put it, we "get along well with", the 'comfort' or 'getting along well with' is definitely a quotient of our situated and historical realities. that would be why a Bengali student necessarily shares rooms with a Bengali student or majority of Arabic participants share rooms with each other. so much as we continue denying it presently, (and this is exactly what we were planning to counter when we claimed to attack caste neutrality in the journal) the claim made in the survey report was specifically addressed to the fact that the getting along well with is not as innocent as it seems. this yet again does not indicate a proliferation of caste considerations at the level of primary intentionality in choosing roommates. that was clearly not the point made and this does not require explication, it was more than obvious from the language. but the fact that our 'traditional' practices seem to be repeated even in our 'modern' setups requires serious analysis and thought if we are really to track caste or any other inequality in its real sites and contexts which seem to have a certain capacity of reiterability as is clear from our present conditions-there is no Dalit professor or 40%-50% of group D employees are Dalits.We ask the rest of the class if they really can think of any 'concrete' reason as to why such a huge majority of shared rooms in the university have people from the same caste?if the unconscious cannot be brought to test, criticism can hardly proceed after a point. that in itself is a difficult task. perhaps a few people we have read might help us to deal with this. We hope this is a satisfactory reply. we can off-course take the qustion to the next class and bring out the 'uglier' dimesions. we, the editors would be more than happy to respond and it also bears upon us to do so.Thanks, GeetanjaliRia JimmyRitamAsmita.

Thank you for the reply.If there is proper study to back up the statement, it is fine. I was just curious because many of the people I know here have roommates who are not from the same caste, or same linguistic or cultural community, and sometimes not from the same religion. But since the situation is hypothetical, I would like to state that it becomes a bit complicated for us to understand the statement without an explaination.Caste consciousness may be importatnt in some cases, but I think what really matters is a common course or a common language, or geographical proximity. Some of the people I know come from the same linguistic community yet have a huge difference in lifestyle and opinions. An M.A. english student will naturally look for an M.A. participant as a roommate. As for the case of Arabic, I think since most of them come from one particular religion, their roommates obviously will be Muslims.I guess what matters is the friends circle. Probably that is why not all people who belong to the same community hang out together.I understand that the aim of the survey was to say that "choosing a roommate is not an innocent phenomenon." But in order to genralize a hypothetical situation, I think other perspectives should also be considered. It is also important taht facts should be made available(cite specific examples, who stays with whom and what are their castes.)I think the survey/study should be made available to end such confusions. If we can have a look at it, it will help us to clarify. It is not a request from me but from many of my friends who find it difficult to agree with the claims. With specific examples, the claims can be justified.Thanks,Shukti